Fate/Kyon's Order: The Return

A Haruhi Suzumiya & Fate/Grand Order Crossover

by Derald Snyder

Part 28: Strategizing

*Simulated Classroom*

"Where am I...?" Ritsuka looked around in confusion. "Was that a rayshift...?"

"Huh?!" Suzuka Gozen gasped, her eyes wide with surprise. "What the hell?! I thought we were dead! Like, LITERALLY dead!"

"We were dead," Robin Hood deadpanned. "But it seems the boss had a final trick up her sleeve... Seems she CAN be useful at times." Ritsuka looked over and saw BB, Haruhi hugging her tightly and sobbing into her shoulder, the AI looking quite uncomfortable.

"Master!" Artesia rushed over to the duo. "Master, are you all right?" Haruhi's response was to let go of BB and pull the saber into a hug instead! "Uh... I suppose that's a yes."

"I'm so sorry..." Haruhi sobbed. "So, so sorry... if only I'd known..."

"Master Suzumiya, you cannot blame yourself," Gawain asserted. "That Beast caught us all off guard. It's clear she had that final encounter planned out to the last detail... save for Blossom here."

"So you were on our side the whole time," Shiki realized. "That's why you sold us the gate keys and Code Casts to defeat the Sentinels!"

"Got it in one!" BB affirmed once she'd caught her breath. "Had to make my 'death' look convincing enough to fool Kiara into thinking I was no longer a factor..."

"But where are we?" Ritsuka inquired.

"This is a special place I prepared, outside of SERAPH's boundaries," BB explained. "About a hundred meters or so above it. SERAPH digitized the Mariana Trench as it moved through it, you see... Due to these special circumstances, the higher you go, the farther you go back in time!"

"Wait! The passage of time is linked to the depth of SERAPH?!" Haruhi gasped, pulling away from Artesia.

"Yep! So I rewound time just a teeeeeeensy bit so you could have a do-over."

"A hundred meters... so about ninety seconds before our deaths," Suzuka deduced.

"About two and a half hours in SERAPH time," Haruhi calculated. "Okay, that gives us time to come up with a plan, at least... Oh shit! What about Meltryllis?!"

"I'm right here, Suzumiya." Haruhi turned to see Melt standing with Passionlip and Violet.

"Are you healed up now?" Ritsuka asked.

"Well, I'm still not in peak condition, but at least I'm intact," the Alter Ego shrugged.

"You should take it easy, sister. You've done more than enough," Violet said in concern. "I suppose I should introduce myself properly. I am Violet, the Alter Ego of purity and the eldest of the Sakura Five. A pleasure to finally meet you all on friendlier terms." She gave a formal bow to the group.

"Nice to meet you, too," Ritsuka bowed back, as did Artesia and Gawain.

"So wait, if the depth is linked to time passed, why wouldn't it be possible to go all the way back, boss?" Robin Hood queried.

"Sure, in theory you could do that, Matcha. But that would involve breaking the speed of light to do so! Not even an A-ranked Servant could survive a trip like that," BB explained. "So you see, there's no escaping SERAPH. The only way to escape is to destroy Beast III/R."

"Beast III...R?" Ritsuka got a confused look.

"Yep! I did some research and found that some Beasts are split into halves," BB nodded.

"R... as in the 'right' side?" Haruhi mused.

"Yes. Though it could also stand for 'rapture'. I came up with that just now."

"But how are we supposed to win against something like that?!" Robin protested. "Even if we were caught off-guard, the fact remains that we couldn't even scratch her!"

"I know why," Haruhi said. "She was using data manipulation to delete any attack before it ever reached her."

"Ohh?" BB grinned. "Care to enlighten us, Suzumiya?"

"Right..." the reality warper turned to Melt and Lip. "Remember what I was telling you about the aliens back at the sanctuary, after Andersen was murdered?"

"Yuki Nagato... and Kuyou Suou," Meltryllis recalled.

"Kuyou Suou?!" Shiki gasped. "The one Suzumiya and I faced in the Cage of the Fallen?!"

"Bingo. As I said before, that wasn't the real Kuyou that attacked us back then," Haruhi extrapolated. "I admit it kinda confused me at the time... But then I thought, what if the Beast and Kuyou were working together somehow? But I never imagined that they had merged into a single being!"

"They WHAT?!" Suzuka gasped.

"Well, THAT explains a few things," BB frowned. "Kiara initially threw Protea into the garbage pile because she couldn't control her. But if she had that alien's data-powers..."

"Right, and all you Alter Egos are basically highly-advanced AIs," Haruhi finished. "Reprogramming you to serve the Beast would've been child's play for the two of them together! Geez, I can't believe I didn't figure it out sooner..."

"Stop beating yourself up, Master," Artesia said firmly. "What you should be doing now is figuring out how to STOP this unholy fusion of Beast and alien..."

"Well, I've got a few things that could help with that!" BB smirked. Pulling up the shop holoscreen, she exclaimed, "Ta-da! On sale now, special Kiara Punisher items! They reduce her ecstasy, seal her skills, and drain her levels to make her more manageable! What do you think?"

"On sale?!" Robin Hood protested. "Uh, did you already forget the part where the WHOLE WORLD is in danger?!"

"Hey, do you know how difficult it was sneaking these under Kiara's nose?!" BB shot back, frowning. "What do you think I was using all that Sakura Money for, anyway?!"

"So that's why..." Haruhi realized.

"But will these even work with that alien's power?!" Suzuka asked.

"...That's a good question, actually," BB's expression turned grim. "To be perfectly honest, the only reason I got that BB Shift from earlier to work was by linking to Suzumiya here before she died... Seems like your power's the only thing capable of bypassing that alien's data manipulation powers..."

"Right, and she knew that, that's why she got me with a sneak attack when these two," she pointed at Suzuka and Tamamo Cat, "went and jumped the gun!"

"Sorry," the two fox servants bowed their heads in mild shame.

"Kuyou Suou is no joke," Ritsuka spoke up. "When we faced her in that one singularity in Haruhi's hometown, only Edmond Dantes could even keep up with her, and it took assistance from two of Nagato's fellow aliens to finally get the upper hand..."

"You have my sympathies, Fujimaru-san," Haruhi laid a hand on his shoulder. "I may be the only one who can surefire put a stop to her, but she still unnerves me a little..."

"So the plan is to use Suzumiya's mysterious power to somehow make Kiara-Kuyou vulnerable?" Violet summarized.

"Yeah, but like I said before, she knows about my power, so we would have to distract her first so I can make my move," Haruhi sighed. "And I was never one much for strategy..."

"Couldn't you use those white giants from that 'closed space', like you did with the giant Alter Ego?" Shiki inquired.

"I highly doubt they'd last even a minute," Haruhi shook her head. "The main advantage that Kingprotea had was her immense size, but Kiara is far smarter and has Kuyou's power to boot, so that probably won't work..."

"Well~, I've got a little something!" BB said with that ever-present smirk, waving her riding crop, something materializing with a cartoonish poof! "You kinda forgot about this after that scrap with Protea, so I salvaged it for my own use..."

"Th-this is...!" Ritsuka's eyes went wide in shock.

"Yup! Not in the best shape, but nothing a Command Spell can't fix, right?" BB grinned knowingly.

"...Geez, I completely forgot about that," Haruhi smiled and shook her head. "Okay, with this, we might just have a shot at making this work... Now, let's put our heads together and figure out how we're gonna do this..."

*An hour later...*

(About an hour or so left until we head out for battle...) Ritsuka thought to himself, looking out at the faux-sunset beyond the classroom windows, illuminating the Japanese city scape below... Looking around he saw Suzuka sitting at another desk, fiddling with a mobile device... In one corner, Artesia and Gawain were quietly conversing, while Haruhi and Tamamo Cat were again catnapping together. Shiki was simply leaning against the wall by the teacher's desk, looking bored out of her mind. The young Master then saw something out of the corner of his eye, seeing Meltryllis approaching.

"Does this school remind you of yours?" Melt said in an uncharacteristically soft voice. "Lip, BB and I have some sort of attachment to this school. Not like we were students though. Rather, our 'origin', so to speak, was a student here."

"So you were all based off a high-school student?" Ritsuka mused.

"Kind of, more or less," Melt shrugged. "BB was born from discarded emotional data that was supposed to be deleted. And then she created us from her own discarded emotions. We, the Alter Egos, are anomalies, bugs in the system that never should have existed. And yet, here we are."

"You're not a computer bug," Ritsuka disagreed. "A mere bug couldn't decide to disobey its own programming to help someone they've never met before."

"Ah..." Melt blushed deeply at this. "...Thank you. You have no idea how much that means to me..." Coming back to herself, she cleared her throat. "Anyway, I came here to ask you... When you go to fight Sessyoin, take me with you. I have a serious bone to pick with her..."

"What?! No! Absolutely not!" Violet came up to them. "It's too dangerous for you, Meltryllis! I forbid it!"

"Oh, now you start acting like the concerned older sister?" Melt raised an eyebrow. "Don't you think it's a bit late for that now?"

"You know as well as I do that I had no choice in the matter!" Violet countered. "But now I do! I'm not letting you risk yourself like this! You put on a brave face but don't think for a moment you can fool me! In your condition-"

"It doesn't matter!" Another voice cut in, Violet turning to see Passionlip. "You don't know anything about what happened, big sister! Melt's got her reasons to see this through to the end! You have no right to deny her!"

"Wha... Lip, wh-what's gotten into you...?!" Violet grunted in mild surprise. "You've never been this forceful before...!"

"She went and grew up on you, that's what happened," Meltryllis taunted. "She's right though. You weren't there... you have no idea the hell I suffered... What I went through just to..." She suddenly trailed off. "Look, I understand your concern, but I have to do this. It's personal."

"Please, Violet!" Passionlip insisted.

"..." The eldest Alter Ego stared at the ground for a moment. "...It's clear that nothing I say will persuade you otherwise. Very well, I'll let Mother know. But Melt..." she looked back up at her sister, "promise me you won't do anything stupid. Please."

"Of course," Meltryllis acquiesced. "Nothing stupid... but I'll do what needs to be done."

"...So be it then." With that, Violet turned and left.

"...I hope she doesn't get mad at me," Passionlip commented once she was out of earshot.

"It'll be fine. Violet doesn't get mad, just disappointed," Melt assured her. "Sorry you had to see that spat, Ritsuka."

"It's all right. She just worries about you, right?" the young Master gave a warm smile.

"Yeah," Meltryllis smiled back. "...When SERAPH disappears, Lip and I will go back to our world, and our bond will be severed. But I'll be side your side until the very end. You're my one and only Master."

"...You aren't... hiding anything, are you?" Ritsuka inquired.

"Not a thing," Melt's smile segued into a smirk. "It's all in the past now. If you escape SERAPH, give my regards to Nagato." And so she turned and left, Lip following close behind.

*To be continued...*